Belarusian/Lesson 11

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The у нескладо́вае letter is considered a consonant. However, it has all features of a vowel except one - it does not make a syllable (нескладовае means non-syllabic).

The ў letter is always preceded by a vowel. Together they form something like English diphthongs: ow in slow etc.

воўк "vouk" a wolf

ла́ўка "lauka" a bench

A y-vowel following the ў letter is read with a й sound.

здаро́ўе "zdarouye" health

Other vowels never follow ў. If as a result of word flexion or derivation ў gets in such a position, it is replaced by в. The opposite is also true. The в letter is never followed by a consonant, and can not be the final letter of the word. In such a position, it is replaced by ў.

Nouns, adjectives, pronouns and adjective-like determiners are deflected by cases. So far, we have dealt with the Nominative, which is the initial case. Nominative singular (Nominative singular masculine for adjectives) is the word form to be searched in a dictionary.

The Genitive case is used to denote a kind of "kinship" between objects: a whole-to-part relation, a producer-to-product relation etc. In such cases, the "master" word (whole, producer etc.) would be Genitive.

In English such relations are usually denoted by the of preposition. Thus, a Genitive word X will most probably be translated to English as of (the) X. The opposite is also true. In Belarusian, there is no preposition that directly corresponds to the English of word. The of+noun expression would most probably be denoted by the Genitive in Belarusian.

The most difficult situation is about masculine nouns ending with a consonant. They can take either а (я for soft consonants) or у (ю for soft consonants) ending. The rule to distinct these two cases is rather complicated.

The а (я) ending is taken by masculine nouns that denote

(a) animate creatures, i.e. people and animals

чалаве́к a person - чалаве́ка of a person

воўк a wolf - ваўка́ of a wolf

конь a horse - каня́ of a horse

(b) countable objects

стол a table - стала́ of a table

хлеў a shed - хлява́ of a shed

(c) body parts

нос a nose - но́са of a nose

хвост a tail - хваста́ of a tail

BUTтвар a face - тва́ру of a face

(d) public organisations

заво́д a factory - заво́да of a factory

прафсаю́з a trade union - прафсаю́за of a trade union

(e) locations, geographical or astronomical names

го́рад a town - го́рада of a town

Мінск Minsk - Мінска of Minsk

Марс Mars - Ма́рса of Mars

(f) measuring units or intervals

год a year - го́да of a year

метр a meter - ме́тра of a meter

вольт a volt - во́льта of a volt

долар a dollar - до́лара of a dollar (даля́р/даля́ра in tarashkievitsa)

Try to think out: Is it possible to invert these sentences, i.e. to say Прыток Дзвіны - Дрыса etc.? Why?

Answer: No. Such sentences would imply uniqueness, i.e. that the Drysa is the only tributary of the Dvina etc. With countries and their capitals it was possible to invert the sentences because we dealt a "one-to-one" relation.